undernimen

English

Etymology

From Middle English undernimen, from Old English underniman (“to take in, receive, comprehend, understand, blame, be indignant at, take upon oneself, steal”), equivalent to under- +‎ nim. Cognate with Dutch ondernemen (“to undertake, attempt”), German unternehmen (“to undertake, attempt”).

Verb

undernimen (third-person singular simple present undernims, present participle undernimming, simple past undernam, past participle undernome or undernum)

1. (transitive, obsolete) To seize; catch; grasp.
2. (transitive, obsolete) To perceive or understand.
   • 1858 (original: circa 1400), Mary Cowden Clarke (editor), Geoffrey Chaucer (author), The Canterbury Tales, in World-noted Women; Or, Types of Womanly Attributes of All Land and Ages, page 107:

     "And with that word Tiburce his brother come;

     And whan that he the savour undernome*

     Which that the roses and the lillies cast […]

     *Undernome—undertook—took in subordinately;—as it were, dimly percieved the scent of the flowers he could not see.

3. (transitive, obsolete) To blame; reprove; rebuke; reprimand; reprehend.
   • 2004 (original: 1357–1371), John Mandeville, The Travels of Sir John Mandeville:

     Alas! that it is great slander to our faith and to our law, when folk that be without law shall reprove us and undernim us of our sins, [...]

   • 2012 (original: ????), Sammy R Browne, A Brief Anthology of English Literature (Lulu.com, →ISBN), page 190:

     And, when she came to the point for to say that thing which she had so long concealed, her confessor was a little too hasty and gan sharply to undernim her ere that she had fully said her intent, and so she would no more say […]